Cheap The Complete Mr. Arkadin (aka Confidential Report) - Criterion Collection (DVD) Price

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Customer Reviews of The Complete Mr. Arkadin (aka Confidential Report) - Criterion Collection

Strictly for the Welles Buff
"Confidential Report" was a movie I'd never heard of before but watched because it was a product of Orson Welles. Even the blindest of Welles aficionados have to acknowledge that our boy has stumbled as much as he has succeeded in the film industry. I'm not quite sure what category "Confidential Report" fits into, however. It begins with great promise; we see a plane flying pilotless over Europe and are promised the real story behind this story. As the story unfolds, we can't help but notice that the supporting cast includes some of the best European actors of the day while the star roles are reserved for a couple of nobodies. Bridging the gap is Boy Wonder himself, Orson Welles, in the title role of Mr. Arkadin. I realize this picture was made around 50 years ago but surely somebody could have done something with makeup and hair-styling because the facial appearance of Welles's character is a joke. He is supposedly a recluse but keeps showing up everywhere. In the meantime, the plot somehow manages to get better as we go along but then it veers back to mediocrity. Welles shows he can still deliver some impressive lines but his co-stars show that they can't. The film eventually goes down in flames as a clumsy love story. Along the way, my ears lit up as I heard Mr. Arkadin tell a story that I heard in "The Crying Game" and nowhere else. That and Welles himself are probably the only two connections to greatness that this film offers. For the Welles fans there are touches of his brilliance but enough clumsiness to leave you more insulted than disappointed. However, it doesn't last all that long and, as I mentioned earlier, there are times the plot moves along quite well.

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Three Versions of Orson Welles' Oblique Tale of Obsession and Corruption.
Orson Welles wrote and directed "Mr. Arkadin" based on 3 episodes of "The Lives of Harry Lime" (1951-1952) radio show, in which Welles starred as antihero adventurer Harry Lime, reprising his role from the 1949 film "The Third Man". Guy Van Stratten (Robert Arden) -con artist, "petty adventurer", and, according to himself, "the world's greatest sucker"- was smuggling cigarettes with girlfriend Mily (Patricia Medina) in Naples harbor when a man named Bracco (Gregoire Aslan) was stabbed on the dock. Bracco whispered 2 names to Mily with his dying breath. One name was Gregory Arkadin (Orson Welles), a fabulously wealthy international financier. Thinking that Bracco's dying words might be worth something to Arkadin, Guy tries to ingratiate himself with Arkadin's daughter Raina (Paola Mori), while Mily uses her charms to get close to him. Disapproving of Guy's relationship with Raina and realizing his ambitions, Mr. Arkadin proposes to pay Guy to investigate his past in exchange for Guy abandoning Raina. Arkadin claims to suffer from amnesia, knowing nothing before he found himself in Zurich in 1927 with 200,000 Swiss francs in his pocket. With this information, Guy criss-crosses Europe trying to reconstruct Arkadin's past. (4 stars) <
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>"Mr. Arkadin" has been called a burlesque and a pastiche of Orson Welles' earlier films. It's not clear whether to take it literally, figuratively, or as satire -although the film's outrightly comic scenes are its best. Robert Arden's performance is often considered the weak spot in the film, because he doesn't make Guy Van Stratten sympathetic. I think Arden portrays Guy's clumsy, obnoxious ambition rather well actually. He's not a sympathetic character, but a junior Mr. Arkadin. There are many wonderful supporting performances. The weakness is Mr. Arkadin himself, who is a caricature rather than a character. Called "the ogre" by his daughter and a "phenomenon of an age of disillusion and crisis" by his enemies, Mr. Arkadin has a ridiculous appearance and manner, and his actions rarely make sense. A large man with a conspicuously coiffed hair and beard, he is simply absurd. Welles' keen sense of the absurd comes through in canted camera angles and lavish, chaotic art direction. The seemingly modern tale is set before an intriguing medieval backdrop of castles, peasants, and religious ritual. The Goya-inspired masquerade ball adds a touch of grotesque to the already unsettling tone. <
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>Adding to the absurdity, Welles often changed his mind about structure and dialogue, forcing some scenes to be dubbed later. Welles himself dubbed several parts, including Bracco and The Professor. That was probably for technical reasons, but it's unfortunate. Scenes dubbed out of artistic whim are recognizable for speech that doesn't match the actors' lips. Welles lost control of the film in the editing process, as usual, ultimately resulting in several different versions of "Mr. Arkadin". Producer Louis Dolivet, a stealthy character himself, took the film away from Welles, because he was editing only 2 minutes of final product per week. Louis Dolivet was a communist who had been Welles' political mentor for a few years in the 1940s. Dolivet later had colorful career as a Soviet espionage agent, but insofar as "Mr. Arkadin" was concerned, he did the capitalist thing and sued Welles. The Criterion Collection offers 3 versions of the film in this "The Complete Mr. Arkadin" set (5 stars). Optional English subtitles are available. <
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>DISC 1: The "Corinth Version" (99 minutes), discovered by Peter Bogdanovich in the early 1960s, is thought to be the last extant version to be under Orson Welles' control. Welles stated that the editing within scenes is true to his intentions. This version isn't horrible, bu it cuts to Guy and Zouk in the Berlin apartment repeatedly in such a manner as to disrupt the flow of the film. Arkadin's rendition of the scorpion-crossing-the-river story is the worst that I have seen, and it spoils his entrance. Bonus features on Disc 1: There is a nice audio commentary by Welles scholars Jonathan Rosenbaum and James Naremore. They discuss the film's origins, visual style, themes, performances, and Welles' directing methods. "The Lives of Harry Lime" (90 min) includes the 3 radio show episodes (audio) on which the film was based, for play on a computer, DVD or MP3 player. The sound quality is not very good. "Reviving Harry Lime" (20 min) is an interview with Harry Alan Towers, who created and produced the radio show. He recalls how Orson Welles came to work on the show, putting the show together, and who may have actually written the 6 episodes credited to Welles, namely Ernest Borneman. There is also a "Stills Gallery" of production stills and behind-the-scenes photos. <
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>DISC 2: The "Confidential Report" version (98 minutes), or the Louis Dolivet edit, which was released in 1955 in Great Britain. This version has the best picture quality, but it's the worst edit. It assumes that the audience will not be able to follow the story unless it is spelled out. The flashback structure is simplified, which at least eliminates choppiness. But the audience is guided by an overburdened voiceover narration. Extraneous scenes are included, particularly in the first 15 minutes, while more interesting material was cut. The introductions to both women, Mily and Riana, make them out to be weaker characters than they are. The scene on the dock with Bracco is longer, contains more explication, and a different intent. The bonus feature on Disc 2 is "Men of Mystery" (25 min), an interview with Welles biographer Simon Callow, who talks about Orson Welles, Louis Dolivet, actor Michael Redgrave, and includes some interview tapes with Robert Arden. <
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>DISC 3: This "Comprehensive Version" (105 minutes) has recently been assembled by film historians/archivists Stefan Drossler and Claude Bertemes from 5 different versions of the film based on comments that Welles made in the years following the film's original release. It is an attempt to create a Welles edit, not the best edit. Although we may know Welles' intentions, it is impossible to know what he would have done had he had the footage in front of him. This version is superior to the others, because the elaborate flashback structure has been restored to working order. But it errs on the side of including too much. For example: Additional footage of Guy approaching Zouk's apartment house gives that scene an inappropriately leisurely pace. In one scene, Mily's dialogue is interrupted then resumed, apparently a mistake. A clip of the plane crashing makes little sense, because it is a subjective camera in an empty plane. Bonus features on Disc 3: "On the Comprehensive Version" (20 min) in which Drossler, Bertemes, and Peter Bogdanovich explain some of the decisions in the new edit. "Outtakes and Rushes" (30 min) are from footage found at the Cinematheque de Luxembourg. "The Spanish Actresses" are alternative scenes with the Baroness Nagel (4 min) and Sophie (7 min) shot specially for the Spanish language version with Spanish actresses Amparo Rivelles and Irene Lopez Heredia.

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Welles' most under-rated film in very impressive box set
Welles had final cut on several other films after Kane, though he had to leave Hollywood and flee to Europe to regain creative control. Othello, The Trial, Chimes at Midnight, The Immortal Story, F for Fake, and Filming Othello were all as Welles cut them and were limited only by budget and the availability of actors. While "restored" versions of Othello and Touch of Evil were released in the 1990s, neither was Welles' cut and the merits of each have been hotly debated (I dislike both of them.) <
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>Mr. Arkadin was the only of Welles' European films that was taken away from him (Don Quixote was never finished because Welles never wanted to.) According to the commentary on this new DVD set, Welles was only completing 2 minutes of editing during post-production on Arkadin per week, so it's not surprising that after 5 weeks producer Louis Dolivet took the film away from him. <
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>What resulted after that was 5 different cuts of the film, 2 in Spanish, 3 in English. This DVD set offers the best two English versions of the film (one titled Mr. Arkadin, the other called Confidential Report) and a new version reconstructed by Stefan Drossler (of the Munich Film Museum) using all the available footage from the 5 versions and outtakes. All three versions look and sound fantastic - they've never been available with such superb quality before this release. <
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>Stefan's cut is 6 minutes longer than the others, and was reconstructed following hints Welles gave in interviews about his conception of the film and using the two earliest cuts of the film as a guide (since Welles was still involved on the cutting at that point.) The result is very impressive, and all three versions of the film have merit and are enjoyable. <
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>The screenplay for the film was cobbled together from several episodes of the radio series The Lives of Harry Lime, in which Welles reprised his character from The Third Man. It has always been said Welles wrote those radioplays, but one of the new interviews in this DVD set calls even that into question. As it is, the story and film are sort of a low-budget pastiche of Kane and The Third Man, with Welles playing a billionaire hiding behind poorly applied make-up who employs a boobish petty smuggler to delve into the secrets of his past. <
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>It's a fun film. Brilliant camera use, a constant in all of Welles' work, some wonderful performances by the guest stars, and in this one some very bombastic performances by the leads. Don't expect the standards set by Kane - get yourself in an Ed Wood/Mystery Science Theatre 3000 mood and you will delighted and astounded. <
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>The DVD set also includes the novel of Mr. Arkadin, which Welles didn't write. The screenplay was novellized in French for a newspaper serial and then translated back into English for the novel. It's not a bad book and offers explications for some things left confusing in the film, though whether it does so in a way Welles would have agreed with is anybody's guess. <
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>Three of the radio episodes upon which the screenplay was based are also included, though they have very poor sound quality and are impossible to understand at points, and it's a shame Criterion didn't locate better copies of them, as great copies do exist. <
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>All that plus several short documentaries, a hefty collection of behind-the-scenes stills, and even outtakes, deleted scenes, rushes, and scenes from the Spanish version featuring different actresses. <
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>An astounding set all-in-all, for Welles' most under-rated film.